Chile Forum

Hey everyone,

I am building a new desktop from scratch. I was wondering if there are any places in Santiago or online that I could source my components from? Or, if there are any international stores you would suggest that ship to Chile? If not, I will purchase everything and get it sent to someone in Canada so I can bring them back with me at Xmas time.

Thanks for the help.

www.pcfactory.cl
www.wei.cl
www.bip.cl

shipping directly too chile from internatin suppliers is expensive.......

using a service such as www.eshopex.com makes it a bit cheaper.....

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There are evidently no decent suppliers for the computers that I use and support (IBM Thinkpads and Lenovo attempts) so for many years all my replacements and spares come from the Evil Empire, by mail, which was not terribly expensive at the time. That includes parts such as lithium batteries from ebay sellers. I have shipped complete laptops here as well as parts and nothing has ever been held up, for customs fees or other issues. Your mileage may differ.

But for a desktop using common/nonproprietary components, your most economical solution is to just buy locally here in Chile.

Thanks.

Have you built a computer here? The prices are crazy high. I am thinking of buying the case in Chile and then buying most stuff in Canada and bringing it back. I was thinking almost everything could go in my checked luggage if I was very careful. I think the hard drive (1 HD and 1 SSD) I would carry on, but the GPU's, CPU, RAM, Disk Drives, and after market fan I would put in my suitcase.

Have you or anyone had experience with this?

I think my build would work out to be twice as expensive if I got everything in Chile. It would be cheaper for me to buy it in Canada and ship it using UPS or FedEx for $1000 or so. But I think the best way is maybe to take advantage of my trip back to Canada and my extra luggage space and weight.

Aedmunds wrote:Thanks.

Have you built a computer here? The prices are crazy high. I am thinking of buying the case in Chile and then buying most stuff in Canada and bringing it back. I was thinking almost everything could go in my checked luggage if I was very careful. I think the hard drive (1 HD and 1 SSD) I would carry on, but the GPU's, CPU, RAM, Disk Drives, and after market fan I would put in my suitcase.

Have you or anyone had experience with this?

take the parts out of the original cases, put them all in one generic packing inside your case, you should get it through without a problem,

have done many times!

patagoniax wrote:.
There are evidently no decent suppliers for the computers that I use and support (IBM Thinkpads and Lenovo attempts) so for many years all my replacements and spares come from the Evil Empire, by mail, which was not terribly expensive at the time. That includes parts such as lithium batteries from ebay sellers. I have shipped complete laptops here as well as parts and nothing has ever been held up, for customs fees or other issues. Your mileage may differ.

But for a desktop using common/nonproprietary components, your most economical solution is to just buy locally here in Chile.

i have batteries from hong kong from ebay arrive every week..... without problems, between $20 - 30 US each one... price in chile is between $60 - 80US

Yea, it would have to be a real emergency for me to cconsider buying a coponent in chile. Think like power suplies and cases are the only things I have bought rather than shipped in years, and the cases are even typically only for low end work stations as they are pretty sad selection. Server cases I would almost always ship. Now with small form factor stations, not sure I would even

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Meaningless sample pricing

Western Digital 2 TB Caviar Green SATA II Intellipower 64 MB Cache Desktop Hard Drive - WD20EARS US$136 from Amazon, plus $30 apprx to ship to CL. Assumes no Customs hangups or charges.

Same drive from WEI in Stgo, incl IVA, cash/check price, 96.000 CLP or about US$196

patagoniax wrote:.
Meaningless sample pricing

Western Digital 2 TB Caviar Green SATA II Intellipower 64 MB Cache Desktop Hard Drive - WD20EARS US$136 from Amazon, plus $30 apprx to ship to CL. Assumes no Customs hangups or charges.

Same drive from WEI in Stgo, incl IVA, cash/check price, 96.000 CLP or about US$196

its about the same if you get stoped for taxes,

If you import 1 item.... and want it this week... its not going to be worth it....

If you use DHL/FedEx etc you will get caught and need to pay tax plus there stupid management fee etc,

Need to do Effort vs Cost evaluation, its going to cost you about 30% more.. is your effort worth it? for me most of the time no.....

But we import in bulk, if we need hardrivers, we buy 10 from amazon!

if i need 1, i buy in chile...

If you get it shipped in, and it arrives DOA, or fails within warranty, you're SOL

CongrioFrito wrote:If you get it shipped in, and it arrives DOA, or fails within warranty, you're SOL

Um, just had a US-sourced item arrive DOA, contacted seller (Amazon) and they credited the full amount of purchase price. Didn't even need to return the item. Not the first time I have had electronic stuff go south and successfully dealt with warranties from the north. One is not necessarily SOL.